LIKE THE TROUBLED SEA
Sometimes the waves of trouble roll over the soul like billows. There is no
time for even a breath of quiet between the overflowing waves as they roll
high over the soul. Austin had entered into such a season of tempest. He
tried to reason out his duty, but could come to no satisfactory conclusion.
He had promised God, the children, and his own soul that he would never
desert the home again; but now he found himself facing the issue once more.
So hard had come the battle between his father and himself that he was at a
loss to know whether either duty or wisdom demanded of him to remain.
Contention and strife were most distasteful to him. Yet it seemed that for
him to maintain any degree of self-respect or to hold to any of his
religious duties brought upon him such taunts from his father that the boy
was at his wits’ end. And his father’s attitude snowed itself more and more
in the children. Besides, he felt the call of youth in his nature, and he
longed to get away from it all and fill his life with those things that his
heart craved to do.
At last he decided that he was wasting his time trying to stay in the
turmoil, and abruptly left his father’s home. Going to town he obtained a
boarding-place and settled down to work. This course again failed to bring
the desired results; and he found himself as restless and unstrung as when
he was at home. He was not happy, could not feel he was doing his duty, and
carried about with him an atmosphere of despondency that gave his friends
alarm. They sympathized with him in his difficulties, but none could help
him. He was face to face with his opposing giant and must fight his battle
through alone.
Over and over he studied the situation as he sat alone in his hired room in
the evening. The children needed him, he had promised to stay with them, he
desired to do them good, he did not want to forsake his post, to be a
deserter; but against all this was his father’s opposition. Ought he to
force himself upon his father? When he was made to feel so unwelcome and
detested, should he still remain? After all, the children were his
father’s, not his. At last he decided to remain away until he should again,
as twice before, be called home.
Now was the time for his youth to assert itself, for if he could not keep
the children, why should he not prepare himself for the place in life he
most wanted to fill? He wanted to be of service in the Master’s vineyard.
There was never a youth with a call to the sea or the plains who longed to
follow the bent of his own heart more than did Austin. So we find him a few
weeks later safely enrolled in a small school where he might prepare
himself for the work of his choice. He knew how bitter his father would be
about this, but he did not care. He was now in entirely new environments.
Instead of opposition and contradiction, he found himself surrounded with
people who were eager to help him on in his service to God. He was under
the care of a man who recognized both the ability and the faithfulness of
the boy and never lost an opportunity to encourage him. But in spite of all
this the billows of trouble rolled high above him. In the midst of the
kindness shown him he seemed to see the faces of his little brothers and
sisters in their unfavorable surroundings. He felt like a renegade from
duty, and something very like remorse beat hard against his heart.
Unable to endure the agony of spirit, he obtained permission to visit his
home and find out how everything was. He found the children already partly
dispersed and the father seeking places for the others. When the children
knew he was again at home, they came back immediately, and their home-life
was once more set up. Everything went quite smoothly for a few weeks, then
the old antagonism began to assert itself and Austin found it impossible to
live peaceably with his father. When there was much friction between the
two, it was hard to control the children, and soon he was meeting his old
obstacles. His victory had not yet come. He remained with the children two
months at this time; but finding it as unpleasant as ever, he again
returned to the school. As soon as he was gone the children were again
scattered about and the home broken. They would write him long letters,
begging him to do something for them; but he did not know what to do, for
he could not support them and take the oversight of the home in every other
way also.
In weeks of uncertainty the time went by, eking out to the harrowed,
homesick boy but a mere existence. What would in other circumstances have
been a pleasure every day was now a torture to him. When he would study, he
saw the faces of the children between him and his book. When he went to
prayer, they alone stood before him, and when in the course of his work he
tried to visit with those who might need his help, he saw only the
children’s outstretched hands before him. The soul can not stand such
torture always, so finally Austin gave up trying to study and went out and
found a job of work, determined to get a neat sum together and, when he had
enough to be of some assistance, go to the children and help them.
It was the evening of only his first day’s work that he returned to his
room to find a letter from Nell.
“Dear Austin: Come home just as soon as you can. Papa is making
arrangements to have strangers adopt the little ones, and we can never have
them again. I can not stand it, and I know you will not want it. Amy and I
are so tired of living away from home. We want a home again and we want all
the children in it. It would never be home without our Doyle and Lila. You
will do something, will you not? You will not forsake us now? Come, please
come quickly.
“Your little sister,
“Nell.”
Austin stood trembling with the letter in his hand, and he could almost see
blood before his eyes, so great was his agitation. The thought of giving up
the two precious little ones forever into the hands of strangers almost
made him wild. Before the morning sun arose, he was on his way home. He
could hardly wait to get there, though it was to find the home broken and
the children scattered. Nell, who had been suffering almost as keenly as
Austin about the little brother and sister, was almost overjoyed at his
arrival, and took heart again. The protest that the two of them put up
against their father’s arrangements forever put an end to his plans. In
another day that danger was past. But Henry Hill was not ready to settle
down, and he had no idea of undertaking housekeeping again. He was just at
this time in a merry mood about going to another part of the State to work
during the autumn months, as the farmers of that region were calling for
help. He asked Austin to accompany him, and promised that if he found a
suitable location he would again get a home for them. Under existing
circumstances this seemed the only thing to do, so after finding places for
Nell and Harry, they set out upon their new expedition with Amy and Doyle.
Lila was left with a kind friend who would look after her.
When they arrived in the town for which they were bound, each of them found
places to work, Doyle remaining in the family where his father was working.
But conditions were not what they should have been for any of the children,
and to Austin the whole arrangement seemed like a horrid dream. In a few
weeks Nell came to them, and a place was found for her with another
household. Poor little scattered orphans, how dark their way looked before
them at this time! When Austin is gray-headed, he will yet remember with a
pang his feelings during those weeks. His father made no effort to get them
a home, and Austin knew not what to do. He saw that he would have to do one
of two things: either take the whole responsibility of the children, or
keep his hands off and let their father dispose of them as he saw fit.
Neither he nor they could any longer stand this uncertainty.
At last his decision was made. He would swing loose from his father
entirely and take the children himself. He believed that if he could get
the cooperation of the girls in just the right way, it would be possible
for them to get along. He did not doubt his ability to support them if they
could keep up the housework. But he would have to depend upon them for that
and he would go out and do a man’s part. It would then be, not the
children, but their father, who must look out for himself, for this new
home was not to be his in any sense of the word. When he had decided to
undertake this responsibility, he went first to his father. “Father,
something has to be done for the children. I believe I can support them
myself. Will you be willing to release to me all right to the children if I
will take them and make them a home asking nothing of you? I want to get
them together once more.”
“You will find it quite an undertaking, but if you want to try it, I have
no objection, and will not hinder you,” was the answer.
The next step would be getting the cooperation of the girls. Without their
willing assistance he could do nothing, and it would mean much for them to
take the responsibility of home-keeping entirely upon themselves.
Fortunately for Austin, he had learned how to carry all these burdens to
One who was stronger than he, and to rely on his God to go before him and
prepare the way.